It took some time on the Land of Waves side, and Rengoku's true body had completed the Eternal Mangekyo as well.
So the clone brought the group of kids and headed back to Konoha.
Rengoku gave the mission scroll to Karin and told her to take everyone to turn in the mission.
They had already done many missions before, so this was naturally easy.
But when they arrived at the mission hall, they immediately sensed something was wrong.
The mission hall that had once been busy now had very few people.
Basically there were only those returning to turn in missions, and no one taking missions.
"Huh? Something feels off," Naruto scratched his head.
If even he noticed, everyone else naturally noticed too.
"Shishou specifically told us to turn in the mission. He must want to tell us something," Karin said cleverly.
Sasuke observed the ninjas turning in missions.
"Look."
He quietly alerted the others.
Sasuke pointed at those ninjas. Every one of them looked serious, even weighed down by worries.
Hinata quietly added, "When we entered the village, I noticed more people returning."
Gaara said in a low voice, "Let's observe a little longer."
The group quietly watched from a corner of the mission hall.
The longer they watched, the more wrong everything felt.
Konoha ninjas were only coming in, not going out. They turned in missions but didn't take new ones.
It had to be known that ninjas didn't always have good missions waiting for them.
Average ninjas rested a day or two after returning before taking on more work.
But a day where ninjas kept returning yet didn't go out for missions was almost unheard of.
This clearly meant Konoha needed a lot of ninja manpower.
The group exchanged glances, "A ninja world war?"
They had done plenty of missions and had taken many lives, but this was their first time encountering a real ninja world war.
When Karin followed Rengoku last time, she had only helped out a little. She didn't know how many Cloud ninjas had died.
This time it seemed a real fight was coming. Otherwise the village would not be preparing like this.
Karin waved her small hand, "Let's go find Shishou!"
———
[Hidden Sand Village]
Because of the unstable state of the ninja world, the Sand was also actively preparing for war.
Originally the Wind Daimyo didn't want to allocate funds to Rasa, but he couldn't ignore the constant actions of Rock and Cloud.
Perhaps thinking this was a good opportunity, the Wind Daimyo unusually allocated a decent sum to Rasa.
Rasa wasn't idle. He was flipping through records related to the Uchiha.
More precisely, records from the village founding era, of Hashirama Senju and Uchiha Madara.
After he finished reading, Rasa rubbed his brow.
These records were barely better than nothing, useless for reference.
The Susanoo recorded for Madara wasn't even the same thing as the Susanoo of the current Uchiha Rengoku.
When Madara and Hashirama founded the village, Madara already possessed the Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan.
His fighting ability could wrestle with the God of Shinobi, Hashirama Senju. Naturally his display was far more terrifying than Rengoku's dozen meter tall Susanoo.
Madara's Susanoo exceeded mountains and took on the form of a war god.
Armor on its back transformed into wings and dual swords, letting it soar through the skies.
A single swing of its weapon could slice open a whole mountain.
These were descriptions of Madara's Susanoo.
But because the Uchiha were described so monstrously, many people felt a disconnect.
Some believed Madara was a once in a millennium prodigy of the Uchiha, capable of such power.
Others believed these depictions were fabricated or exaggerated, that Susanoo couldn't actually be that large or strong.
Rasa leaned toward the first view.
But what was certain was that after Madara's death, the Uchiha hadn't produced someone of his strength for decades.
So although Rengoku was strong now, the Sand didn't think he was unbeatable.
After all, current intel showed Rengoku's Susanoo was only about a dozen meters tall.
Compared with Madara's Susanoo, it was incomparable.
Facing a dozen meter opponent, there were at least strategies one could consider.
"Lord Kazekage, we noticed sandworm traces."
An Anbu came to report.
Rasa's eyes lit up, "Good. Bring the sealing squad. Move out immediately!"
———
Compared to the resource rich Land of Fire, the Land of Wind had scarce resources and limited biodiversity.
But the Land of Wind wasn't without large creatures.
Besides common desert creatures, the Land of Wind had a huge beast called the sandworm (based on the sandworms from Dune).
A sandworm's head alone was five to eight meters in diameter, and its body could easily reach over a hundred meters long.
It normally moved underground in the desert, feeding on minerals.
Its outer hide was extremely tough and its strength immense. In earlier years it caused some chaos in the Wind Country.
But after the founding of the Sand Village, with tail beasts and a Kazekage who could use Magnet Release, things changed.
Sandworm hide became an expensive export leather, and its flesh had high medicinal value.
So sandworms were hunted nearly to extinction.
Why not make them summoning beasts? Because sandworms were poorly suited to any environment other than the desert.
And their food intake was enormous, with minerals being a necessity. They couldn't be kept.
For this invasion of the Land of Fire, lacking methods to counter Susanoo, Rasa naturally sent people to search for sandworms.
He didn't have much hope. Sandworms were rare now.
He had panned for gold many years and barely seen them.
But unexpectedly, they were fortunate this time.
On a sand dune in the Land of Wind, Rasa glided over on a platform of gold dust.
Below, a sensor ninja waved a small flag.
When Rasa landed, he pointed to a sand pit.
Inside were obvious depressions and piles of mound-like material.
That was sandworm dung.
Rasa stepped off the sand platform, placed his hand on the dune, and closed his eyes.
More and more sand came under his control.
He quickly sensed sandworms feeding, and not just one, but several.
He opened his eyes, a bit eager.
Though raising sandworms consumed a lot, for a short time it was manageable.
Soon the sealing squad arrived.
Rasa drew a rough circle on the ground and marked the sandworm positions.
The sealing squad prepared their setup.
No one spoke because sandworms were extremely sensitive to human voices.
If someone spoke, they might flee.
After about an hour, the sealing squad raised a flag to signal completion.
Rasa stepped onto his gold dust platform and flew near the pit.
He clasped his hands. A massive amount of chakra gathered.
Then he leapt off the platform and slapped his palms onto the ground.
The sealing squad formed seals at the same time, and the entire area was locked by a barrier.
As the ground trembled, two ferocious heads burst violently out of the sand.
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